"Leak" is word used by Kilgore Trout, a character from many Kurt Vonnegut novels, to mean mirror. Mr. Kilgore Trout, was a science fiction writer who, like most science fiction writers, hadn't the slightest bit of interest in technical details. But he did have a wild imagination of other planets, alien civilizations and alternate universes. His imagination led him to speculate that mirrors were really weaknesses in the barrier between alternate or parallel universes, hence "leak." When someone in Kilgore Trout's presence would express their need to urinate by saying "I have to take a leak," he would respond "where I come from that would mean you are planning to steal a mirror."

leaf site = L = leaky heap

leak n.

With qualifier, one of a class of resource-management bugs that occur when resources are not freed properly after operations on them are finished, so they effectively disappear (leak out). This leads to eventual exhaustion as new allocation requests come in. memory leak and fd leak have their own entries; one might also refer, to, say, a `window handle leak' in a window system.

--The Jargon File version 4.3.1, ed. ESR, autonoded by rescdsk.

Leak (?), n. [Akin to D. lek leaky, a leak, G. leck, Icel. lekr leaky, Dan. læk leaky, a leak, Sw. läck; cf. AS. hlec full of cracks or leaky. Cf. Leak, v.]

1.

A crack, crevice, fissure, or hole which admits water or other fluid, or lets it escape; as, a leak in a roof; a leak in a boat; a leak in a gas pipe. "One leak will sink a ship." Bunyan.

2.

The entrance or escape of a fluid through a crack, fissure, or other aperture; as, the leak gained on the ship's pumps.

To spring a leak, to open or crack so as to let in water; to begin to let in water; as, the ship sprung a leak.

 

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Leak, a.

Leaky. [Obs.] Spenser.

 

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Leak, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Leaked (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Leaking.] [Akin to D. lekken, G. lecken, lechen, Icel. leka, Dan. lække, Sw. läcka, AS. leccan to wet, moisten. See Leak, n.]

1.

To let water or other fluid in or out through a hole, crevice, etc.; as, the cask leaks; the roof leaks; the boat leaks.

2.

To enter or escape, as a fluid, through a hole, crevice, etc.; to pass gradually into, or out of, something; -- usually with in or out.

To leak out, to be divulged gradually or clandestinely; to become public; as, the facts leaked out.

 

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Leak (?), n. (Elec.)

A loss of electricity through imperfect insulation; also, the point at which such loss occurs.

 

© Webster 1913